In April 1993, a Korean resident in the United States, who was working as the chief of the Koryo Research Institute at William Carrie University, visited Pyongyang.
There was a reason for him to come to Korea.
A month before he had heard that the Fifth Session of the Ninth Supreme People’s Assembly of the DPRK would be held, and he had waited to see what would be decided at it with bated breath. Having heard that the Supreme People’s Assembly would convene just a few days after the Order of the Supreme Commander of the Korean People’s Army on declaring a state of semi-war throughout the country was issued, followed by the announcement of the statement of the DPRK Government on its withdrawal from the NPT, he was anticipating that the DPRK would adopt more hardline countermeasures at the session. His expectation was in line with that of the world community.
Around that time, a foreign media organization reported as follows: “Hard hit by the successive strikes from north Korea, the US and other hostile forces, heavily wounded, are fearful like frogs in a thunderstorm, awaiting the result of the session of the Supreme People’s Assembly of the DPRK.”
However, no one had anticipated what would happen at the session. It published the Ten-Point Programme of the Great Unity of the Whole Nation for the Reunification of the Country, written by President Kim Il Sung.
After hearing the world-startling news which the international community was calling an “event that has brought the falling parts of the globe together,” filled with great admiration and excitement, he flew to Pyongyang in the hope of meeting President Kim Il Sung.
President Kim Il Sung granted his ardent desire. At a reception he said to the President that the Ten-Point Programme of the Great Unity of the Whole Nation was an excellent blueprint for national reunification and that Kim Il Sung should take office as the president of a reunified federal republic.
Kim Il Sung, with a smile on his face, told him that he had no desire to become president; all he wanted was to see the country reunified as soon as possible, and he continued:
“To achieve the great unity of the entire nation is the only way to national reunification at present. To reunify the country, there is no other way than to realize the great unity of all Koreans in the north, in the south and abroad. The unity of the entire nation will enable us to solve all the problems which we encounter in reunifying the country.”
And he went on to explain the purpose of the recent publication of the Ten-Point Programme of the Great Unity of the Whole Nation, its main idea and its contents, item by item, in the context of its relations with the Ten-Point Programme of the Association for the Restoration of the Fatherland he had published during the anti-Japanese armed struggle, as well as the problems arising in understanding them.
Listening to the President’s long explanation, he could clearly comprehend the logic of the President’s achievements and his idea on national unity, manifested in the Ten-Point Programme of the Association for the Restoration of the Fatherland, the proposal for founding the Democratic Federal Republic of Koryo, the adoption of north-south agreements and the Ten-Point Programme of the Great Unity of the Whole Nation.
Upon his return home, he expressed his view on the programme:
“The Ten-Point Programme of the Great Unity of the Whole Nation is the fruit of President Kim Il Sung’s painstaking efforts, deep thought and study for the reunification of the country.”
